D&D 5E Is 5e "Easy Mode?"

[Monayuris]

Fair enough. You like mundane fantasy with Joe average characters. That sounds staid and not fun at all but if you have a group of players that has buy-in on that (and I mean actual buy-in not assumed or forced buy-in) then that means you and your group are having fun. This is good. It is not the baseline of D&D since 2E but one thing that is good about RPGs: they can be customized to taste.

You personally don't think that is fun.

Stop telling me that the games that I have fun playing aren't fun.

Yes. You are correct the average encounter of standard difficulty is not meant to kill the PCs barring really stupid decisions or uniquely ill luck. Instead they are designed to use resources, move the story along, and have the PCs feel like they matter and are accomplishing something in a cinematic fashion like larger than heroes.

Why is story important? Is playing D&D about telling a story or about having adventures? I don't want the outcome prewritten. It is hard to explain but as a DM I don't care what happens. I don't have a story to tell. I don't have any influence. I just present a world and adjudicate it fairly. I will do no less as a DM and I expect no less as a player.

Yes. The character's abilities are important because again not since 2E is the default that the PCs are Danny Devito who just decided one day to adventure. They are a cut above the average person in terms of stats by default. Also, let's be clear; this is not unique to 5E. This has been the default since 3rd edition and people seem to like it despite the very vocal OSR protests.

I don't understand this criticism. What in the world are you talking about? What does Danny Devito have to do with anything? Explain your argument more clearly.

No. Nostalgia is not a hipster fade. Clearly, the OSR who look at back at 1E/2E style games with rose colored glasses are nostalgic. In their nostalgia they forget the numerous house rules and outright ignoring of the rules that a lot of groups (I would dare say the majority) had to make the game playable and enjoyable.

Wrong.

If you look at old school games as an adult in the modern time, you see a different style of D&D. Maybe you don't understand it, but it is just as valid as any game you play now. Maybe the rules introduced in B/X are just fine and create a very interesting and intense gameplay. A style of gameplay that can't be achieved with modern D&D but a valid and engaging gameplay nonetheless.

Cool. You like what you like. I would say survival horror is pretty accurate description however. Have you ever tried games like Warhammer Fantasy Role-play, Zweihander, Hackmaster, and so forth? I honestly think they would be more to your taste.

D&D old school works fine for me, thank you. No need for me to go to other games. 5E is fun but it is not always the best option for certain campaigns. You use the tool that best fits your need. If you want high fantasy adventure, 5E is a good choice. If you want a more mortal centric low powered game OSR is the better choice.

 

[Monayuris]

I'm going to have to ask for more details here: How are your party able to fly at will, never run out of spells or healing etc?
That has not been the case with any group I've run or played in until at least beyond double-digit levels, and I'm pretty sure I don't ave any houserules that would affect that.

Fair question...

Assimars can fly when they want to. Druid, Cleric, Bard have huge number of healing spells. LIke enough healing such that I have to really push things to challenge the players. Like cheat hardcore.

That is pretty much the ethos 5e was aiming towards. Character death does happen, but it is more often due to making a mistake rather than rolling badly on a single d20 roll. Or saying that you were checking the door, but not specifying that you were checking the lock.

I'm in agreement here. A mistake in player choice should lead to death, not just a bad roll. The problem is that no matter how hard I try to explain, players in 5E just want to roll skills for everything. They have a character sheet full of skills and they want to roll them. I guess if they want to put the life of their character into a die roll they can, but why shouldn't they rather examine the situation and role play a solution instead???

If your characters can faceroll every encounter, your DM is going seriously easy on you. If everyone in the party feels that way, ask the DM to step things up a bit. Do you and the rest of the group tend to optimise somewhat?

My group optimizes hard core. I run challenging encounters. But I'm not going to beat them over the head. I build encounters based on an assumed reality... meaning I'm not tailoring encounters to the specific group, instead I'm creating a realistic world. But when a level 5 party blows out a CR 12 creature with no consequence, there is a problem. The game is broken.

That sounds more an issue with classes (and possibly races) available than editions. You would get that in most editions from a spellcaster.
Jon Snow is a very accomplished fighter, and may well be reasonably high level in 5e terms. But the GoT setting is not one in which the spellcasters of any edition would fit beyond extremely low levels.

How do you determine whether your character does heroic acts in the face of adversity in challenging environments or dies in that pit trap, if not from your use use of your character's abilities?

So don't play a spellcaster and you should be fine.

You as a player make choices. You decide to search an area. Or investigate something. You don't rely on skill rolls or rules segments, but instead take a more proactive approach as a player.

 

[Flamestrike]

Fair question...

Assimars can fly when they want to.

Err... for 1 minute at a time, and only 1/ long rest, and only protector assimar.

You have a party of protector assimars?

And its hardly 'at will'. That's literally only for a single encounter per adventuring day, of which there should be around half a dozen.

 

[dave2008]

The problem is that 3.5 and other modern D&D's shot a little too far over heroic fantasy for my tastes. My 5E group is only level 5 and they can fly at will, have the ability to allow all of them to breathe underwater, see in complete darkness (including magical darkness), not need to consume rations or forage for food, be able to get stealth at any time, they never run out of spells or healing (spell caster heavy party which is something 5E encourages).

To me level 5 should be Game of Thrones not the Avengers.

It totally can be much more GoT than Avengers at level 5 and beyond. My group has only one magic user, a wizard, and 4 martial characters (2 fighters, a rouge, and a homebrew spell-less ranger). The only way I have limited the wizard is that after 5th level spells were not automatic, he had to find scrolls or travel to a distant guild to buy them or get trained (downtime) in spells above 3rd. The effect being that I (DM) have some control over what spells they learn (though I tend to listen to what they want). We have a few other house-rules that make it a bit more "realistic" or "gritty" for us, but I assure you, they don't play like superheroes!

If you want a more GoT game, it is fairly easy to do. The first step: limit or eliminate full casters or possibly even any caster classes. I mean, everyone in GoT is basically some version of a fighter or rouge.

 

[dave2008]

But when a level 5 party blows out a CR 12 creature with no consequence, there is a problem. The game is broken.

Actually, that statement tells you nothing about the game. Why shouldn't a party (4-6) players blow out a CR 12 monster?

 

[Cap'n Kobold]

Fair question...

Assimars can fly when they want to. Druid, Cleric, Bard have huge number of healing spells. LIke enough healing such that I have to really push things to challenge the players. Like cheat hardcore.

Hmm. A 5th level full caster can heal around 81 HP of damage each Long rest in general. That sounds like a lot, but bear in mind that is assuming that they're burning all their spells on healing. (Which is generally not the optimal use of all spell slots.) Spread out among the 6-8 encounters that a party should be facing, that's not much compared to the likely damage the party should be taking. They only get one or two spells per encounter, and the rest of the time they're down to cantrips or weapon attacks.

I'm in agreement here. A mistake in player choice should lead to death, not just a bad roll. The problem is that no matter how hard I try to explain, players in 5E just want to roll skills for everything. They have a character sheet full of skills and they want to roll them. I guess if they want to put the life of their character into a die roll they can, but why shouldn't they rather examine the situation and role play a solution instead???

You as a player make choices. You decide to search an area. Or investigate something. You don't rely on skill rolls or rules segments, but instead take a more proactive approach as a player.

There is a balance to be struck between "My character is an expert at everything that I am, even if I dumped their Int and Wis" and "Roll on skills for everything." You can't expect a player to be able to talk you through every step of finding a trap even if their character has Expertise in Investigation. A reasonable middle ground is to remind the players that they tell you what their characters do, and you tell them if they need a roll to resolve it. Get them to start giving you at least the approach that their character is taking, but don't abuse it with gotchas or pixel-bitching. Have successful checks give clues or information rather than the complete solution to a problem.

You wouldn't hand the player an iron bar and insist they show that their character can make that Strength check, so requiring them to demonstrate the ability to make an Int check rather than their character is also a little unfair. However most problems take more than just an ability check to resolve.

My group optimizes hard core. I run challenging encounters. But I'm not going to beat them over the head. I build encounters based on an assumed reality... meaning I'm not tailoring encounters to the specific group, instead I'm creating a realistic world. But when a level 5 party blows out a CR 12 creature with no consequence, there is a problem. The game is broken.

The baseline game and CRs assume a 4 person party of fairly casual players, no optional rules and no to minimal magic items fighting mixed encounters of multiple creatures over a 6-8 encounter "day" with two short rests.
If you have more people, use feats, your players optimise, or you have more magic items, this will bounce the CRs involved higher.
If you have few encounters per day, this lets the party "nova" to beat much higher CRs than they could if that encounter was their 5th or 6th tat day and they had already used resources.
If you have the party fight a single creature, even a legendary one or with lair actions, the sheer action economy involved is massively in the party's favour. Almost always use minions or some other requirement to split the party's attention.

 

[tetrasodium]

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If your characters can faceroll every encounter, your DM is going seriously easy on you. If everyone in the party feels that way, ask the DM to step things up a bit. Do you and the rest of the group tend to optimise somewhat?

It's not that simple. Back in prior editions there were tools available to the gm that allowed them to force the players to rethink the standard strategies and balsnyce the costs of quickly shifting themselves into new ones. 5e lacks those kinds of narrowly focused tools leaving the gm with much more crude and unfocused options that poorly fill the need. I put together a post earlier giving several examples when someone kept simply claiming that 5e has such tools but was unsurprised when there was no willingness to expand and support that argument in defense of 5e beyond "this is wrong".

 

[Cap'n Kobold]

It's not that simple. Back in prior editions there were tools available to the gm that allowed them to force the players to rethink the standard strategies and balsnyce the costs of quickly shifting themselves into new ones. 5e lacks those kinds of narrowly focused tools leaving the gm with much more crude and unfocused options that poorly fill the need. I put together a post earlier giving several examples when someone kept simply claiming that 5e has such tools but was unsurprised when there was no willingness to expand and support that argument in defense of 5e beyond "this is wrong".

5e still has tools available. Nastier monsters, or more of them, more encounters per long rest or changing the schedule of recovery. Inflicting conditions like exhaustion or reduced HP maximum. Terrain or objective adjustments.

That is before you get into actual house rules like the extended short rest, or slower healing variants.

5e isn't as tunable as 4e, but probably better than the pre 3e versions.

 

[Flamestrike]

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It's not that simple. Back in prior editions there were tools available to the gm that allowed them to force the players to rethink the standard strategies and balsnyce the costs of quickly shifting themselves into new ones. 5e lacks those kinds of narrowly focused tools leaving the gm with much more crude and unfocused options that poorly fill the need. I put together a post earlier giving several examples when someone kept simply claiming that 5e has such tools but was unsurprised when there was no willingness to expand and support that argument in defense of 5e beyond "this is wrong".

I'll bite.

What do you want me to do exactly?

 

[Oofta]

I'll bite.

What do you want me to do exactly?

There is nothing you can do, other than admit that he's right. Various people have tried over various threads. Made suggestions, explained how they did it, gave examples of what they've done ... it doesn't matter.

But good luck!